Players probe Elite game space mystery

Elite Dangerous gamers are working feverishly to decipher a puzzle uncovered by one player of the space simulation.

The puzzle is in the shape of a map hidden in a signal sent when a player scanned a mysterious in-game object.

Some suspect that the signal means a hostile alien race is about to arrive in the game.

Frontier, which makes Elite, has declined to comment on the discovery of the signal or its significance.

Elite Dangerous is a space trading and fighting game set in a massive simulation of the Milky Way.

Alien empire

The mysterious object is one of several “unknown probes” that were added to the game in a recent update. One player discovered that when the probe was scanned with their spaceship’s sensors these objects glow and then respond with a transmission that temporarily disables their craft.

Reports of the response spread quickly online and many players subjected the message to different types of analysis which eventually revealed a strange diagram buried within it.

Some have interpreted the map to point to a region of space that players currently cannot explore. It is believed to be off limits because many suspect Frontier plans to use it as the location for the star-spanning empire of the alien Thargoid race that has appeared in all other Elite games.

Others say the map simply points to strange structures on the surface of a moon called Merope 5C that have already been discovered. Many other theories about the map’s meaning are being heavily debated on social media and Elite’s discussion forums.